Category Archives: Energy

The three videos I’m posting here are excellent summaries of the nature of nuclear power, pro and con. I’ve always been pro-nuclear power for the simple reason that it produces the most energy besides fossil fuels, for the least ecological impact. So-called clean energy like solar and wind have massive problems, aside from the wildlife they kill, the cost to make them far exceeds their energy production. In other words, they are largely boondoggles that take tax dollars that could be used for other things and largely wastes it. Better technology will be produced and would be produced sooner if that money had been spent on R and D.

Nuclear. however, has the best safety record in all of energy. The reactors last for a long time. And the most famous accidents mostly occurred in communist countries with poor safety standards and designs. The other big one being in Japan which is geologically unstable. The Fukushima reactor disaster was caused by the double whammy of an earthquake and tsunami. It’s difficult for anything to avoid acts of god.

This first video explains nuclear power in a nutshell.

Now for the con argument. The biggest ones are the few nuclear accidents that which were 30 years apart. And the fact that nuclear waste has to be buried deep in the ground. The second and can be answered with policy. The first with better safety and design. They also bring up the fact that necular power plants can be used to produce fuel used in weapons. What they don’t say is how hard it is to be created. And the fact that advances in design could eliminate that problem. This will be explained in the third part.

A lot of scare tactics are used to suppress nuclear power development. But any environmentalists are coming around to the notion that nuclear power really is a green energy. It ;s the least environmentally toxic when you consider that if properly dealt with, the waste can be safely contained. The French, who are the most nuclear friendly nation per capita (80% of their electricity comes from nuclear power plants) and a large exporter of energy to the rest of Europe, have developed an excellent container for waste disposal that works. The science of processing nuclear waste will continue to advance until there is no issue anymore. So here’s the pro-nuclear argument in a nutshell.

In the final analysis, it’s a better solution in these times to many other sources of energy. As technology advances, it will be eclipsed by things like nuclear fusion and others. But in the meantime, it’s something we know that works andf can take care of our needs. The only thing holding us up is politics and ignorance.

While the events in Japan may give the anti-nuclear power fanatics an argument to use against future nuclear power, the fact is all the world’s nuclear power plants are based on very old technology. There are new innovations that solves a lot of the problems nuclear power may have (which have proven to be very few after all this time, it takes catastrophes for the plants to be a problem for the environment).

Thorium may be the answer nuclear power has needed all this time. Thorium based reactors are much smaller, are even portable. Do not have the problems that water based reactors have. And thorium as a fuel is more plentiful than uranium. We have enough in storage already to power the country for decades.

Scientists say the revolutionary ‘STAIR’ (St Andrews Air) battery could now pave the way for a new generation of electric cars, laptops and mobile phones.
The cells are charged in a traditional way but as power is used or ‘discharged’ an open mesh section of battery draws in oxygen from the surrounding air.

This oxygen reacts with a porous carbon component inside the battery, which creates more energy and helps to continually ‘charge’ the cell as it is being discharged.
By replacing the traditional chemical constituent, lithium cobalt oxide, with porous carbon and oxygen drawn from the air, the cell is much lighter than current batteries.
And as the cycle of air helps re-charge the battery as it is used, it has a greater storage capacity than other similar-sized cells and can emit power up to 10 times longer.

There’s one simple way they can help turn the economy around and they won’t do it. In fact, the Democrats are costing the US economy trillions of dollars according to a new study.

Restrictions on oil and gas drilling will cost the U.S. economy $2.36 trillion through 2029, according to a study requested by state utility regulators and paid for in part by industry-sponsored groups.

Drilling restrictions in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and off the U.S. coastline are blocking access to about nine years’ worth of U.S. oil and gas consumption, according to the report. Among sponsors are the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners and the industry-funded Gas Technology Institute, of Des Plaines, Illinois.

Former President George W. Bush and Congress ended bans in 2008 on drilling along the U.S. coastline. The Interior Department hasn’t acted to open the newly available areas, including offshore Alaska and on the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Congress has kept the Arctic refuge off limits.

Just think what they already cost us. They could have been pumping oil almost 40 years ago when we had the first energy crisis.

The Democrats have been blocking the US from pumping its own oil (or refining it, no new refineries are being built and they’re needed). They’ve tried to shut down coal in this country and blocked natural gas production. They are against America’s energy independence while at the same time calling for it.

It’s clear that they’re not serious. When it comes to the election this year only vote for those politicians who are for drilling. Don’t base it on what they say now, base it on their track record.

Obama is doing something that on the surface sounds like a great idea, pushing nuclear power. Except his alleged support for it is fraught with typical anti-science stupidity this administration is becoming famous for.

Obama singled out nuclear power in his State of the Union address, and his spending plan for the next budget year is expected to include billions of more dollars in federal guarantees for new nuclear reactors. This emphasis reflects both the political difficulties of passing a climate bill in an election year and a shift from his once cautious embrace of nuclear energy.

He’s now calling for a new generation of nuclear power plants.

During the campaign, Obama said he would support nuclear power with caveats. He was concerned about how to deal with radioactive waste and how much federal money was needed to support construction costs. Those concerns remain; some say they’ve gotten worse.

His administration has pledged to close Yucca Mountain, the planned multibillion-dollar burial ground in the Nevada desert for high-level radioactive waste. Energy Secretary Steven Chu has been criticized for his slow rollout of $18.5 billion in loan guarantees to spur investment in new nuclear power plants, and the administration killed a Bush-era proposal to reprocess nuclear fuel.

Yes, he wants to close down the only storage site in the US designed to hold waste. A site that’s over 100 miles from a major city (Las Vegas) and which has been studied to death. The best argument they can use against it is in some hypothetical earthquake the materials could be pushed to the surface from where it would have been buried 100s of feet below the ground. If there was an earthquake like that, nuclear waste would be the least of your concerns. But logic and hysterics are never companions.

The government spent $38 billion dollars building the site after years of feasibility studies, but spendthrift Obama wants to close it while at the same time claiming he is for Nuclear Power.

It’s taken decades for so called greens to come to the conclusion more educated people already knew, that nuclear power is the cleanest man made energy source, more powerful than anything other than fossil fuels. And cleaner than any other. Unlike hydro electric dams or windmills, wildlife isn’t harmed by it.

The 104 nuclear reactors in operation in 31 states provide only 20 percent of the nation’s electricity. But they are responsible for 70 percent of the power from pollution-free sources, including wind, solar and hydroelectric dams.

Now that’s bang for the buck. The high costs of reactors has more to do with fighting off all the NIMBY and “green” lawsuits that come with building one.

The nuclear waste issue is the only major problem and it would be dealt with if we had Yucca Mountain. But Obama wants it closed.

His push for Nuclear power, coupled with green ideologue, Energy Secretary Steven Chu’s slow roll out of loan guarantees for reactors, an attempt to woo Republicans and Independents in an election year. That’s not going to happen over an issue like this. Especially when he is screwing up so badly in so many other ways.

60 Minutes did a segment on how Fusion power is becoming a hot topic again. I don’t know if this is true or not. Cold fusion has some serious problems, but if they found a way to make it work, it could solve all our energy problems as well as put to rest all that CO2 BS.

The problem I have with it is its a little too convenient that the story is coming out now. When you have an administration made up of green ideologues who might be willing to throw billions at this research without checking it out first.